George

Doorway To Hell

The little incident I describe below was my introduction to prison. I am not proud of how I dealt with it. Especially I see it as not only weak but probably a bit stupid of me to pay the protection fee. But I was just an ordinary person trying to survive in an insane situation that I knew nothing about. You, dear reader, can judge if you wish. I don’t think I have nearly the vulnerability to how I might be judged by others that I did before my prison experience. Now I am much more likely to have an attitude that says, “people can think what they think. What do they know?”

What I am describing is my first day in prison – my first minutes of this ordeal. In another room I had, with a group of others, been showed, told to shave, examined and put into an orange suit. This was my first step into what for me was a hell.

“Ripper” and “Skinner” were derogatory term for “sex-offender.”

This little description was taken from my book, “These Were My Realities” where my whole experience was described in detail. Like the rest of that book, it is meticulously accurate. Most of it was written down as it was happening, or very shortly afterwards. Only the names were changed.

- 0 -

Stripped, scrubbed and with my new identity in hand I proceeded down the hall, as instructed, to the next level of hell.

I entered A Pod through the double metal doors and was directed to my room. A Pod consisted of a large central room surrounded by two tiers of cells. An enclosed area with a glass divider protruded from one of the walls. This was the “bubble” where the guards spent most of their time. My room was on the second tier. My roommate, a young man in his early 20’s, was lounging on the bottom bunk. I introduced myself and we talked a bit.

Right off he asked me point blank what my charge was. This was the question I had dreaded from the beginning but, even though I had thought of doing so, I had not made up a story ahead of time. One of the reasons for my neglecting to do this was that I was pretty sure that people would either see me on the T.V. News, or run into an article in the newspaper. My plan, such as it was, was simply to be evasive until I could see whether I might slip by unnoticed. The most anxious moments I have experienced in this ordeal have generally been about being “outed.” I remember how deeply I dreaded the consequences of my indictment and charges appearing in the newspaper and the T.V. The media is a major player in the system of torture this society has established for the punishment of those who have offended its sense of decency. Punishment does not begin with a guilty finding in court but with the report of the “alleged” crimes in the newspaper.

In response to my roommate’s direct question I said, “assault” and when he questioned me further I said I didn’t want to talk about it. It was not smooth at all. But as I was soon to discover, I was right in my assumption that there was no way I was going to slide by unnoticed.

I had a rather pleasant conversation with my roommate. It turned out that he was a drug dealer, and a general wheeler and dealer, but he was nevertheless a rather appealing person. I was a daddy for him at first sight and it was clear that, except for the charges against me, I would have no problems coping with him.

After supper, which was served in the large enclosure and eaten at metal picnic tables, two other men came up to me to make my acquaintance. They also asked me point blank questions for which I was ill prepared. They seemed genuinely friendly which turned out to be the case. However, under questioning I admitted that the charges concerned sexual assault. They told me it would be better not to admit this. They were being helpful. I left the encounter feeling I had made a mistake. I guess it was my fatalism about the problem being discovered anyhow that made me so ineffectual.

During the afternoon session in the rec room I watched TV, hoping it was not their policy to watch the news. They watched sports and I was left in peace.

After supper my roommate, George, I will call him, stood in the doorway to our cell while I sat on my bunk, and he told me about his current concerns. He had several cars, a fair bit of cash, and an odd assortment of other expensive goods he had bought with money he made selling drugs. His girlfriend had promised to be faithful to him while he served his four years, but she had sold all his goods and ceased writing to him. He couldn’t even get her to send some money for the commissary. He also talked about his need for a father and how that would have made a difference in how his life was turning out. He said his mother claimed that she became pregnant with him after his father raped her.

The first indication that I had been discovered came to me when I heard someone from the next cell (or the one below mine) saying my name. Sounds are transmitted through the ventilation and plumbing system and it is hard to tell where they come from. Then I heard quotes from the local newspaper article about me. Even though I had neither seen nor heard the article I knew this is what it was. I could have written it myself.

The voice from below got George’s attention and told him he was rooming with a skinner.

George looked shocked. His potential new daddy was a skinner. He asked me about it and I did not deny it.

George was about 5’ 10” and fairly well built. He was a lot younger than me. He certainly had more experience fighting than I did. However he did not appear to be much stronger than me. I felt I would be close enough to being his match so as to not make it worth his while to try to beat me up. He was afraid of crazies and I could be a crazy if push came to shove. At first I felt intimidated by his swagger and bragging. But then I remembered the chimpanzee who discovered that by banging two garbage can lids together he could terrify the other males in his group and vastly increase his prestige. There is a lot of garbage can lid banging in prison. Assessments of this sort went through my mind as I sat on my bunk and watched George react to the news. But he was not to respond with violence.

“I’m not judgmental,” he said finally. He shook his head. “Still, I don’t know what to think.” He asked me more about it. I said I could not tell him what actually happened. But it was not the kind of thing one would assume from reading the newspaper. He pointed out that his friends were “solid guys.” By this he meant the blustering would-be-alpha-males on the unit. They would not be happy with him. Still, he did not threaten me.

After he thought it through for a few minutes, George came up with his conclusion.

“Look, this thing could go one of three ways. First, I could get myself taken out of this room, I know how to make that happen. Second, you could get sent to protective custody.” He spent a bit of time telling me why this was probably a good option – reasons, which I have since learned, were essentially accurate.

“Third,” he said, “You could pay me something.” There was no threat in this. He simply pointed out that he would get a lot of flack from the “solid guys,” which turned out to be true. He needed something to make this worthwhile to him. He had no money at all now in his account. He desperately wanted a radio. He said he might be able to get some of the guys to back off a little bit on the harassment they would certainly give me. He could physically protect me if someone attacked me. And he could give me someone to talk with in the room.

It was a business offer. He neither threatened me nor implied he would rile up others against me. The threat from the others was real enough without his doing anything in that regard.

“I’m not rich,” I said. “You may think I’ve got lots of money, but I don’t.”

“Could you come up with sixty or seventy dollars?” he asked.

The truth was that in many ways this did not sound like too bad a deal. Having a roommate with whom I would be safe and who might have some influence with the people on the unit who would probably be the most dangerous ones to me might actually be worth something to me.

“The thing is,” I said, “suppose I paid you the $60.00. What’s to prevent you from deciding a week down the line that this is turning out to be harder than you thought for, and that you need another sixty, and then another.”

He nodded. He understood this to be a reasonable concern. He looked down, scratched his head and said “All right. Suppose we said $100 and that would be all.”

“Whatever shit your friends give you or anything else,” I said. “This would be a one time payment?”

He agreed.

“If you came back for more I wouldn’t pay it… whatever…” I said.

He nodded again and I told him I needed to think about it. I mulled it over in my mind weighing the potential risks and benefits as best I could in an unfamiliar scene.

Finally I looked at him, still standing in the doorway. “I can see you really need the money,” I said, “and I’d like you to have it. Also I can see that your friends will give you a hard way to go if you room with me. But if they knew I paid you anything they might think I was an easy mark. Then after you left, someone else might come after me for money, and I wouldn’t pay them. So it’s in your interest as well as mine that this is confidential.”

He nodded.

So we came to an agreement.

I suppose someone must have spread the news about why I was in prison during the last recreation period (between 7 and 8). At any rate on the first night of my stay in A pod I experienced the night calls on the dorm. I was, of course, unable to see anything or even guess who was shouting. They were just voices and screams in the night – loud, raucous, full of hate and venom – animal-like voices in their primitive intensity but with a malice and hatred that was distinctively human.

“Hey, Hunter, you piece of shit.”

“You go to ‘check in’.” [Slang for commit suicide]

“Why’d you do it?”

“Why don’t you kill yourself – I’ll do it for you.” And the chants started by one person and finished by another: “Rip – per”

“Skin – ner” It continued for perhaps a half hour and then died out. The newspaper article had not yet been seen by everybody, and they had not yet been incited to their full fury.